John Stickney hosted a 30-day 30-poem exercize for April.
Here’s mine.

This is my 6th or 12th or ??th poem-a-day run… once years ago started a poem-a-day and wrote at least one per day for 6 to 8 months.

This batch felt good.

~ ~ ~

April fools
I & I
oh happy daze

~ ~ ~

Mobius Lip

Have a new product — fake feces: call it Sham Poo

Too often chicken humor is just a bunch of bad yokes

My rock ‘n’ roll’s more walk ‘n’ stroll

If you’re a wharf, are you judged by your piers?

Wanna be happy? Try merryjuana

I used to breed dogs, but my penis got tired

If the road’s faulty, it must be the asphalt

I need a refresher in walking Escher

Dying’s no way to live

~ ~ ~

A fog and rain and cold day
not my first
not my last

~ ~ ~

After the Garden

Cold warm cold this cruelest month
fog dimming Eliot Street
dirt heat sweet to uncool night
lilacs lost in memory’s desire
root pain faux gain
for the fool
the devil
and the tower toppled

Eve ever nude admires herself
in the skin of the apple
the cat’s meow
the yellow fog
of frog on log

~ ~ ~

My belly’s filled
my bum is wiped
I’m set to good and go

~ ~ ~

Which end are you —
fork handle
or tines?

Holder, or held?
molder or meld?
dealer, or dealt?

~ ~ ~

Sirens night wail
coyotes harmonize howl
we quiet between

~ ~ ~

Manimals

Dog on floor snoring
wife clacking laptop
my lap cat purr

His human leaving
he barks and whines
in Stockholm syndrome

Dogs piss on things
cats knock stuff over
I do both

~ ~ ~

Life with Wife 11

Soaking sun in parking lot awaiting wife
at dentist when she sends this text:

“Be careful, I guess there’s a guy outside the building
with a knife. They are calling the cops.”

I hide my weed.

~ ~ ~

Suntimes

After midnight alley
of serpentine night
up dances sun

Yellow electric line
across bright blue sky
catches eye

Spring growth
slabs of yellow, white, greens, blue
hope

Sun shines down
on cold-hearted humans
rotting in their gold

Sometimes sun
on eye-closed upturned face
is enough

Sit in sun
suck its go
become autotroph

~ ~ ~

Six Thoughts in Search of a Brain

It is what it is
you know how it goes
life

Walking dog
my pain versus his needs
constant compromise

Lotta levels
to unfolding disaster
from “Oh fuck” to “Holy fuck”

Is writing renga
by yourself
masturbation?

There’s no
below below which
I will not go go

It’s one of those days
best to get some sleep
start again

~ ~ ~

Status Report 304

The fireplace nibbles
bit by bit at the dark
and cold

Wind chimes
and old-time bong clock
trickle talk

Stone life nice
easier on others
and myself

~ ~ ~

Status Report 305

Life’s hard
you’re bored
I’m slow

I turned 24 in prison
with 9 months
till go

~ ~ ~

Reached my goal
made it from wake to sleep
no medals please

~ ~ ~

No Beginning No Middle No End?

Is it the Big Bang?
The Big Bounce?
Some Conformal Cyclic Cosmography?
They cry cosmological inflation
graceful exits
and mirror worlds
but where are the sky splotches?
The space blobs?
The primitive gravitational waves?
Primordial black holes?
Right-handed neutrinos?
Why is that side of the sky
the same temp as this side?
Why no isolated photons?
Come on dudesses and dudes
give me something to work with here
besides the steady state universe
or eternal inflation
(sounds like my household expenses)
the long poemed multiverses
the sexually oscillating universes
with its Big Crunch
and “branes in bulk”
Is it a flat hologram projected onto the surface of a sphere
or digital simulation on a vast computer?
What is this no time no place space
we rebound from
beyond this event horizon’s
no beginning no end
of no place to be or have been?

~ ~ ~

Spirit to bone
bone to flesh
flesh to worm
worm to earth
earth round sun
sun around a long long time
the rest
but time and chance

~ ~ ~

She lies sleeping in our broken chair
beneath once-plush blanket
body weary from work
responsibility, stress
maybe me
due my 27 years extra entropy
as I crumble toward compost
and posthumous fame

I know I make her life better
and worse
of curse
while she refines me and mine
sublime

The world’s tooth and claw
flee and fight and fuck and feed
but within pus of need
and bleed
we heed occasional pockets of plus
the flowered field, the honey flow
the sun of warm and slow

~ ~ ~

Lesson Plan

4-wheeled ants
scurry to hurry
rat wheel cage

Weathered whether
grows and slows
rise or slide of time

Big-bellied men
fat-assed women
who’s who’s?

Magic life
where creed bound by bleed
sniffs at breath

Tooth and claw
claw and tooth
always been the truth

False profit of want
drives new god of get
awaiting fall from tree

Greed crawled from swamp
to lower limbic lesion
and named itself Capitalism

Right lane ends
wrong lane continues
while rich bitch other’s sins

Long ago
and far away
back when I believed

~ ~ ~

This almost summer night
thick with existence
road hiss
cricket creep
frog peep
broken muffler mash
dream schemes
waiting glue of dawn
when again
we get our rock
again upward go
where again we all fall down
again
and again
and again
man woman and child

There’s some insect
has no mouth
it’s born, flies, mates, dies
all in one day
no future, no past,
no planning, no ask

~ ~ ~

Pocket Marks

Was dating Construe
but she left
now I miss Construe

Lady’s digging green growths
from artist friend land
can’t wait to see her bloomers

Ass Prof sez Nose Prof fails
while Nose Prof knows
it’s nose not tail

Sometimes Botox
and sometimes
Bo doesn’t talk

Hired new law firm
– Tooth, Claw & Fang…
tired of pussyfooting around

Cow nipple juice
and bee vomit —
the land of milk and honey

Used to go to church
to Sunday worship Gauze
but my beliefs unraveled

~ ~ ~

Universal Health Care

Norway since 1912
Japan – 1938
New Zealand – 1938
Germany – 1941
Belgium – 1945
United Kingdom – 1948
Kuwait – 1950
Sweden – 1955
Bahrain – 1957
Brunei – 1958
Canada – 1966
Netherlands – 1966
Austria – 1967
United Arab Emirates – 1971
Finland – 1972
Slovenia – 1972
Denmark – 1973
Luxembourg – 1973
France – 1974
Australia – 1975
Ireland – 1977
Italy – 1978
Portugal – 1979
Cyprus – 1980
Greece – 1983
Spain – 1986
South Korea – 1988
Iceland – 1990
Hong Kong – 1993
Singapore – 1993
Switzerland – 1994
Israel – 1995

the U S of A
still drinks the blood of babies

~ ~ ~

Life with Wife 12

She said dead Leonard Cohen
sang this to her in her dream:

“I don’t want to hurt you
Like a battle wound
I freed the bell
I freed the bell
I freed the bell
I had to take”

~ ~ ~

Dog Day

Drifting into WouldaCouldaShoulda Land
I’m stopped by dog bone gnaw
look down
he’s on the floor
laser focused
scraping dead flesh
tonguing the marrow between
he’s *present*
Mr Be-Here-Now
who’s right
we gotta gnaw the bone we got
not some mythical later maybe better
or long lost perfect unicorn past
you do this bone
your bone
you scrape for scraps
suckle the marrow
and try again tomorrow
for moral

~ ~ ~

Dirt hides seed
heart holds need
desire grows

Today butterfly
yesterday caterpillar
tomorrow dead

First things first
which hurts worse
life… or birth?

The problem
with people
is people

Let’s face it
we’re all fucked up
one way or odder

It’s always a battle
between the proletariat
and the lariat

Stay in line
or pay the fine
no drifting from the herd

Everyday I make
from wake to sleep to wake
copy? clone? clown?

~ ~ ~

Fire walking water
water weighing time
time slipping slowly
somewhere down the line
where railroad trains moan happy
where even power’s kind
where weary worry wanting
never works the mind
cuz here folks getting nasty
here folks fuck the fine
here folks know the knife-back
here flux greed is grind
so while I don’t know what you’ve found
I keep my head underground

~ ~ ~

Converation with Wife 52

What do you call a mutated cow?
A moo-tant

What’s a cow who doesn’t moo?
Moo-t

A brooding cow?
Moo-dy

Where do French cow strippers work?
Moo-Lawn Range

Cow’s cultural center?
Moo-seum

They also attend moo-vies
watch Mickey Cow’s Moo’s-keteers

Trend toward moo-notony

Some become werecows under a full moo-n
while others read their favorite book – Leaves of Grass

Okay, this has been a-moo-ving
but time to moo-ve on

Thanks for the moo do

Oom

~~ ~

Beneath the bridge
in still warm water
fish wait
for the vibration of the coming train
to rattle the old wooden trestle
shaking down the bugs
from the underside
into the water
for dinner

~ ~ ~

Walking from kitchen to living room
swinging my arms
my forefinger thumps something

I look down
see 3 inch primitive black & pale wasp of 3-segments
circle me slowly then move on

I tingle with the might-have-been

~ ~ ~

Vector Graphic

Sun on face
dog on prowl
creeping myrtle licking feet

Too early
I park in alley
count rats

Warm dirt
cold night
fog

~~ ~

Bird treasure
shiny bits
left today
to pay
for yesterday’s kindness